December Daily 2014 – Day 8

Tags

ali edwards, Christmas, December Daily, elf on the shelf, Memory Keeping, photography, Scrapbooking

Hi!

Day 8 started off with much excitement at our house. The Elves are back! Paige was thrilled.

I wrote directly onto this photo with a gold gel pen. That is a big deal for me as I am not a fan of my own writing. But it was quick and it got it done, right?

I made an insert out of a couple of Christmas coffee cups. It’s pretty funny. My friend Sarah and I catch up at least once a week for a coffee and we were discussing Starbucks Red Cup photos (we don’t have a Starbucks here). The girl at the cafe thought I was crazy when  asked for these cups. I’ve recorded the story and slipped it in between the two cups.

I got a few new page protectors in different configurations. These ones are perfect for me as I prefer to use square photos.

Here are the photos of the spreads:

The cup is kind of a joke but I like the texture that it adds to the page. Might stick a photo onto the back of the red one…

Thanks for looking.

Sharon

 

 

December Daily 2014 – Day 7

Tags

ali edwards, Christmas, Memory Keeping, Scrapbooking

Day 7 – Sunday. It was another ordinary kind of day for us. We did some Christmas shopping – looking for more ornaments. I particularly love going to the shops at this time of year because of the decorations.

I need to put a journal spot on that Santa photo, we have been checking out the different ones to see where to get ‘the’ Santa photo done. It won’t be with this guy.

 

This picture is a 6×8, I copied the idea from my friend Sarah at Documenting Chaos, it is the shop window at Peter Alexander. I squeezed Paige into the window and then rushed outside to get the photo. My mum is standing behind the black banner just in case she fell out. The dachshunds as reindeer were just adorable.

This is one of the cards from the Ali Edwards kit, it is very festive and Christmas-y which is what I wanted for this page.

Here are our elves – Holly and Ralph – I’ve been wondering when they would make an appearance. Paige decided they must have been waiting for the school holidays to start. She was pleased to see them this morning, they were sitting by our fake fireplace with 2 Frozen eggs. I added a wood veneer directly onto the photo.

Here are photos of the spreads:

 

Thanks for looking

Sharon

 

 

 

December Daily 2014 – Days 5 & 6

Tags

ali edwards, Christmas, December Daily, Memory Keeping, Scrapbooking

Hi!

Day 5 – Friday, was a crazy one for us. It was the last school day of the year and finished at midday. The story of the day is about how much I appreciated the great teachers that we had. This is our first ‘last day’ but I imagine this will become something that I document each year.

I popped a photo into the first embossed pocket (from the Stamp Spot)

On Friday afternoon we went to the shops and Paige saw this reindeer at Santa’s workshop, she was fascinated. There is nothing of me in this album so far so I have included this one which is of one of my good friends and I – we went to a work Christmas dinner.

This page is a 6×8 photo that I have backed onto one of the Ali Edward cards. When I find my punch I will add the holes and put it straight into the album. The decoration is one that I found from an artist on Etsy.

Day 6 – Saturday, was a fairly typical one for us but there just weren’t a lot of photo opportunities. I have included a journal card and a couple of photos of some of my favourite new decorations.

Here are a couple of shots of the layouts:

 

 

Thanks for looking 🙂

Sharon

 

 

December Daily 2014 – Day 4

Tags

ali edwards, Christmas, December Daily, Memory Keeping, Scrapbooking

Hi!

The story of Day 4 is that it was the 2nd last day of school for Paige. There was a lot of gift giving and celebrations.

The teachers put on a beautiful powerpoint presentation of the classes highlights, it is incredible how much these little kids have grown and developed. There was a little party at the end for the children and parents to enjoy.

In the album on the left, I have included a 6×8 of our Christmas Star – I am wanting to swap that out for an Angel topper but am waiting to find the perfect one.

This red wooden ornament is a gift from the kids in the class (with some chocolates) to say thanks for helping out with reading in the classroom.

This little insert is a page protector that I cut in half. It has one of the PaisleePress cards and piece of transparency.

On the back of the insert is a photo of a decoration that Paige made me. Adorable!! That cute little guy will becoming out every year forever. 🙂 Will add some bling to the back of the transparency.

I like to include Paige’s Christmas art in the album too. I guess she won’t always want to make it so it is ALL going in now. This star was the card that went with the gift of the framed handprints in the background. It is going to leave a trail of blue glitter every where it goes.

 

“Dear Mum Merry Christmas Love Paige”  Awwwww. 🙂

I put the story directly onto the top photo. Will probably add a journal spot or something to the bottom one.

This page has a photo of the gifts we gave to the teachers. The other one is today’s haul of Christmas cards and gifts from school friends. I will put a journal spot on here somewhere too.

Here are the photos of the spreads:

Thanks for looking.

Sharon

December Daily 2014 – Days 1-3

Tags

ali edwards, Christmas, December Daily, Memory Keeping

Hi there, my sporadic crafting continues this year.

I did this project in 2012 and loved it, in 2013 I started (still have the photos) but didn’t finish – I will remedy that soon.

I am going to try to complete my 2014 DD each day as my 5 year old just loves looking at them so much. This year I am using a Simple Story SNAP album that I already had. I have a ridiculous amount of ‘Christmas Stash’ that I will be adding to a couple of great little kits that I got from The Stamp Spot. My friend Sarah from Documenting Chaos gave me some of the Ali Edwards papers from her kit – they will be added in too.

These pages are just the beginning, I may go back and bling them up a bit more when I get into the groove.

Day 1

 

Day2

 

Day 3

 

Thanks for looking 🙂

Sharon

 

 

 

Week in the Life – Wednesday photos

Tags

ali edwards, Instagram, Memory Keeping, photography, Scrapbooking, week in the life

Hello!

Still enjoying the process of capturing the ‘everyday’. This is not an ideal week as I am on leave but I am still finding plenty to photograph. My plan was to use the dSLR more but I find the self timer mode tricky.

Not my favourite task but the uniforms have to be ironed. I am almost never organised enough to have them done in advance. It actually gives me a few minutes to think about what else has to get done for the day.

 

On Wednesdays I volunteer at the school and do reading with the children. Paige loves that I go and do this with her class.

 

I swear I do not go out for coffee everyday (just this week, lol). Caught up with my beautiful friend Deb and we had a great chat and I helped her pick out a hat for Melbourne Cup Day.

 

I am an avid crafter but have not done a great deal of sewing for quite a while now so it was great that I got a bit of sewing done (first successful shot with the self timer).

 

This was the rigmarole to try and get a breakfast shot…. hmmm. Keep trying.

 

Paige had a GREAT day at school, someone bought in ice-creams for a birthday celebration.

 

I cooked dinner, something I like to do.

 

Paige doesn’t sleep well without this guy. She has had him since she was a few weeks old. My obstetrician gave him to her. We make sure he is always packed into the bag that goes to Nana’s when Paige sleeps over.

Here is the Wednesday template:

 

Thanks for looking.

Sharon

Week in the Life – Tuesday Photos

Tags

ali edwards, Instagram, Memory Keeping, photography, Project Life, week in the life

Hi there!

I have been taking all sorts of photos and am trying to stay focused on capturing the ‘everyday’. Mostly I am using my iPhone but will try to get a few more with the dSLR tomorrow.

My Breakfast

 

Paige’s sight words. I am putting in a really big effort to be patient with her, we read through these every morning and she gets tested at school on Friday mornings. She is very proud to get 5 out of 5 for the last two weeks.

 

Got some housework chores done in the morning. Not very exciting but glad it was done.

 

Am making the most of my week off to catch up with lots of friends this week. Today I met up with Tracey for a coffee at Cafe Society. Was great to see her.

 

Hit the bank before picking Paige up from school.

 

It is really starting to heat up here and Paige thought it would be a great opportunity to get wet when I put the sprinkler on to water the grass. She whipped her clothes off and was running around and squealing in no time.

 

Reading is important in this house. I like to read some books with her every night that we are home (when I am not working).

 

But this is what she prefers to do, I let her have a few minutes on the iPad when she has been good.

 

Here is the Tuesday template.

That was Tuesday.

Cheers, Sharon

Week in the Life – Monday photos

Tags

ali edwards, Instagram, Memory Keeping, photography, Project Life

Hi!

I am currently doing the Ali Edwards ‘Week in the Life’ project. I can tell already that I am going to find the journaling the most challenging part.

Below are some of the pictures that I have taken this week.

Sunday night/Monday morning, Paige slept at Nana’s house while I went to work. Here she is tucked up in bed just before I left.

 

My fussy eater did a great job eating her grandmothers roast dinner, it is starting to get easier.

 

Freshly ironed school uniforms, Paige attends a beautiful school and she is really blossoming into a very confidant little student. She dresses herself at Nana’s before I pick her up in the morning after work.

 

 

Our cat Isobel, she was disgusted that I fed her catfood – she definitely prefers tuna.

 

I worked a night shift on Sunday night so have included a few work photos as I will be on leave for the rest of the week. Usually my work roster determines everything else that is happening in this family so a week at home is not our ‘usual’.

 

These halls are bustling during the day, but at night time it is very quiet. I love working the night shift but suffer as I am so, so, so tired.

 

This is what is required to tame Paige’s curly hair. If I don’t condition it turns into a total mess. She doesn’t enjoy doing her hair and it can be a real drama if we have knots, I’ll try anything for a quiet life…

 

 

I usually try to not sleep during the day after my last night shift in the hopes of getting to bed at a reasonable hour. This doesn’t always happen but I kept busy doing some errands on Monday morning.

 

Had a lunch date with my good friend Sarah from Documenting Chaos, she is doing this project too.

 

Mission accomplished, a busy day that finished with Paige asleep in my bed.

 

I will be using the Ali Edwards templates, here is the title page for Monday. Most of the printing and embellishing will happen next week.

 

Thanks.

Sharon

 

 

Dilly Bag-a-long

Hi Everyone,

I recently decided to join in with Angie from GnomeAngel in her Dilly Bag-a-long. It has been a very long time since I have unpacked my sewing machine as I tend to do mainly hand sewing these days.

The Dilly Bag pattern by Judy Newman is the perfect mix of English paper piecing and machine sewing.

I made a very dodgy looking template and got into the fussy cutting. I used a selection of fat quarters and got to work on the hexagons and came up with something a bit different to what I’ve been doing lately.

 

 

The placement of the hexagons was a random thing, I just tried to not have two the same next to each other.

 

As a very recent convert to using glue over hand-basting, I find it so much quicker and that gives me more time to join them up (and maybe even finish some projects 😉 )

I like to remove the papers at the end of the project, it keeps the ‘fabric’ together while it is being handled a lot.

After getting all of the hexagons joined it was time to unpack my very neglected sewing machine (I’m just glad that she was still talking to me after all of this time).

It would have been handy if I could have found some pins too (in my defence most of my stuff is packed while I move between houses).

 

Another great thing about doing this bag-a-long is that I discovered that I am not the only quilter in the house… Paige (5) was very intrigued with the whole process.

 

My basic sewing skills came back to me and I was able to put together a bag that resembled the pattern.

 

After a more than two year absence from any machine sewing I would highly recommend this pattern to anyone who is looking for a quick and cute little bag.

Ta-dah!!

 

 

Check out this blog post with some beautiful hexies:

Wednesday 23 September: Sharon @ Simple Things

 

The following bloggers will also be (or have) participating in the bag-a-long

Friday 26 September: Sharon @ The Projects of My Life – that’s me!!

Wednesday 1 October: Judith @ Just Jude

Friday 3 October: Progress link party here @ GnomeAngel.com

Wednesday 8 October: Kate @ Stitched with Love

Friday 10 October: Kathy @ iamacraftykat

Monday 13 October: Barbara @ Sunflower Stitcheries

Wednesday 15 October: Rachel @ Little White Dove

Friday 17 October: End link party here @ GnomeAngel.com

Thanks for a great little pattern Judy, and thanks to Angie for organising this bag-a-long. I may leave the sewing machine out and see what else I can do. 🙂

Cheers,

Sharon

 

Stay tuned – more posts coming.

Hi,

It has been so long since I have blogged that I’m not sure if anyone comes here any more.

I will be posting some sewing and quilting posts soon.

S